Page 55 of The Mafia’s Girlfriend

My heart thumped wildly and the tension that gripped me didn’t disappear after that encounter with Antonio. Seeing him always upset me. It disgusted me, and hearing his comments about taking me and sharing me filled me with rage and fear.

Luke didn’t leave my side, rushing to the car with me. I assumed it was him that kept the guards back. He was the reason no one tailed us.

I didn’t think about it, relying on the urgency to just get. To get the fuck out of here while I could and put distance between me and the man who wanted to own me.

Krista slept in the back. I was relieved to see her. As Luke started the car and drove off, I reached over the seat to feel her pulse.

“She’s alive,” he reported, driving quickly and checking his mirrors. Hs jaw twitched with tension, and his eyes remained slitted, in concentration to get away and anger.

He had to have found her and carried her out.

“They drugged her.” My observation was pointless.

“And they could’ve done the same to you.” He slammed his fist on the steering wheel. “Emma, what the hell is going on?” He glanced at me, skewering me with a hard glare. “How do you know those assholes?”

I didn’t want to say. If I did, he’d walk away.

“The mafia? They’re the fucking Marcheses.”

Oh, I was well aware of that fact.

“What the fuck are you doing messing with the mafia?”

“I’m not messing with them.” If I could, I’d run far from them and never come back. I wasn’t sure how someone could erase their family and flush out their blood to start over like that though.

“Those people are dangerous.”

I exhaled hard through my nose. Tell me something I don’t know!

“Do you hear me?” He huffed an incredulous laugh. “The fucking mafia, Emma.”

“I heard you the first time.”

“How the hell are you connected to them? What is going on?”

I bit the inside of my cheek, warring with the duplicity of not telling him.

“Emma!” He shouted, and still, Krista didn’t stir. “Answer me.”

Please, please don’t hate me. He was so adamant that he should avoid me because he didn’t need more trouble in his life. And here I was dragging him through the worst of it.

“Why are you hanging around dangerous men like that?”

“I’m not!” I never, ever chose to be near the Marcheses.

“It looks different from my perspective.”

His jaw ticked with annoyance.

“Those men are killers. Leaders of the underground. Fuck, Emma. You can’t be this naïve.”

I glowered at him. “I’m not naïve.” I knew more about those mafia men than he did.

“And you don’t care how dangerous they are?”

“Like you should talk!” I pointed at him. “You’re just as dangerous as them.”

Even worse, he was a danger to my heart. It was two seconds from cracking, crushed by the weight of knowing we would never be able to stay together with the truth of who I was and how deeply I’d be thrust into the Marchese rule at the end of the summer.